Mary Oliver - A Thousand Mornings. Poems

S ELECT T ITLES ALSO BY M ARY O LIVER POETRY American PrimitiveDream WorkNew and Selected Poems Volume OneWhite PineThe Leaf and the CloudWhat Do We KnowWhy I Wake EarlyNew and Selected Poems Volume Two Swan PROSE Blue PasturesWinter HoursA Poetry Handbook THE PENGUIN PRESS Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephens Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi 110 017, India Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England First published in 2012 by The Penguin Press, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Copyright Mary Oliver, 2012 All rights reserved constitutes an extension of this copyright page. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA Oliver, Mary. p. cm. cm.

ISBN 978-1-101-59597-8 I. Title. PS3565.L5T54 2012 811'.54dc23 2012027310 No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors rights. Purchase only authorized editions. C. G. G.

Jung, The Red Book Anything worth thinking about is worth singing about. Bob Dylan, The Essential Interviews I GO DOWN TO THE SHORE I go down to the shore in the morning and depending on the hour the waves are rolling in or moving out, and I say, oh, I am miserable, what shall what should I do? And the sea says in its lovely voice: Excuse me, I have work to do. I HAPPENED TO BE STANDING I dont know where prayers go, or what they do. Do cats pray, while they sleep half-asleep in the sun? Does the opossum pray as it crosses the street? The sunflowers? The old black oak growing older every year? I know I can walk through the world, along the shore or under the trees, with my mind filled with things of little importance, in full self-attendance. A condition I cant really call being alive. Is a prayer a gift, or a petition, or does it matter? The sunflowers blaze, maybe thats their way.

Maybe the cats are sound asleep. Maybe not. While I was thinking this I happened to be standing just outside my door, with my notebook open, which is the way I begin every morning. Then a wren in the privet began to sing. He was positively drenched in enthusiasm, I dont know why. And yet, why not.

I wouldnt persuade you from whatever you believe or whatever you dont. Thats your business. But I thought, of the wrens singing, what could this be if it isnt a prayer? So I just listened, my pen in the air. FOOLISHNESS? NO, ITS NOT Sometimes I spend all day trying to count the leaves on a single tree. To do this I have to climb branch by branch and write down the numbers in a little book. So I suppose, from their point of view, its reasonable that my friends say: what foolishness! Shes got her head in the clouds again.

But its not. Of course I have to give up, but by then Im half crazy with the wonder of itthe abundance of the leaves, the quietness of the branches, the hopelessness of my effort. And I am in that delicious and important place, roaring with laughter, full of earth-praise. THE GARDENER Have I lived enough? Have I loved enough? Have I considered Right Action enough, have I come to any conclusion? Have I experienced happiness with sufficient gratitude? Have I endured loneliness with grace? I say this, or perhaps Im just thinking it. Actually, I probably think too much. Then I step out into the garden, where the gardener, who is said to be a simple man, is tending his children, the roses.

AFTER I FALL DOWN THE STAIRS AT THE GOLDEN TEMPLE For a while I could not remember some word I was in need of, and I was bereaved and said: where are you, beloved friend? IF I WERE There are lots of ways to dance and to spin, sometimes it just starts my feet first then my entire body, I am spinning no one can see it but it is happening. I am so glad to be alive, I am so glad to be loving and loved. Even if I were close to the finish, even if I were at my final breath, I would be here to take a stand, bereft of such astonishments, but for them. If I were a Sufi for sure I would be one of the spinning kind. GOOD-BYE FOX He was lying under a tree, licking up the shade. Hello again, Fox, I said.

And hello to you too, said Fox, looking up and not bounding away. Youre not running away? I said. Well, Ive heard of your conversation about us. News travels even among foxes, as you might know or not know. What conversation do you mean? Some lady said to you, The hunt is good for the fox. And you said, Which fox? Yes, I remember.

She was huffed. So youre okay in my book. Your book! That was in my book, thats the difference between us. Yes, I agree. You fuss over life with your clever words, mulling and chewing on its meaning, while we just live it. Oh! Could anyone figure it out, to a finality? So why spend so much time trying.

You fuss, we live. And he stood, slowly, for he was old now, and ambled away. POEM OF THE ONE WORLD This morning the beautiful white heron was floating along above the water and then into the sky of this the one world we all belong to where everything sooner or later is a part of everything else which thought made me feel for a little while quite beautiful myself. AND BOB DYLAN TOO Anything worth thinking about is worth singing about. Which is why we have songs of praise, songs of love, songs of sorrow. Songs to the gods, who have so many names.

Songs the shepherds sing, on the lonely mountains, while the sheep are honoring the grass, by eating it. The dance-songs of the bees, to tell where the flowers, suddenly, in the morning light, have opened. A chorus of many, shouting to heaven, or at it, or pleading. Or that greatest of love affairs, a violin and a human body. And a composer, maybe hundreds of years dead. I think of Schubert, scribbling on a caf napkin.

Thank you, thank you. THREE THINGS TO REMEMBER As long as youre dancing, you can break the rules. Sometimes breaking the rules is just extending the rules. Sometimes there are no rules. HURRICANE It didnt behave like anything you had ever imagined. The wind tore at the trees, the rain fell for days slant and hard.

The back of the hand to everything. I watched the trees bow and their leaves fall and crawl back into the earth. As though, that was that. This was one hurricane I lived through, the other one was of a different sort, and lasted longer. Then I felt my own leaves giving up and falling. The back of the hand toeverything. But listen now to what happened to the actual trees; toward the end of that summer they pushed new leaves from their stubbed limbs.

It was the wrong season, yes, but they couldnt stop. They looked like telephone poles and didnt care. And after the leaves came blossoms. For some things there are no wrong seasons. Which is what I dream of for me. TODAY Today Im flying low and Im not saying a word.

Im letting all the voodoos of ambition sleep. The world goes on as it must, the bees in the garden rumbling a little, the fish leaping, the gnats getting eaten. And so forth. But Im taking the day off. Quiet as a feather. Stillness. Stillness.